As long ago as 1976 EMI had the idea of recording Mendelssohn’s incidental music for A Midsummer Night’s Dream absolutely complete. André Previn’s disc with the LSO, still sounding satisfyingly full-bodied in its latest budget reincarnation, offers not just the complete movements but the fragments – often with quotes from such number as the Scherzo or the Nocturne – illustrating such episodes as the ‘Spells’ and the ‘Removal of the Spells’. Often only a few bars long, the fragments tend to sound inconsequential heard ‘dry’, but here on a Virgin disc devised by EMI’s French section are those same fragments, as well as the usual complete numbers, set in context of the relevant Shakespeare scenes.

Even with that extra spoken material there is still room on the disc for the rousing Ruy Blas Overture as a colourful bonus, making an attractive package. John Nelson and his French orchestra may not quite match Previn and the LSO in springing Mendelssohnian rhythms, but the playing is still fresh and alert, meticulous over phrasing, with the recording admirably transparent, giving clarity to the excellent wind playing. The chorus, slightly nebulous behind the orchestra, is atmospherically caught, and the soloists come over well, notably Rebecca Evans.

What may be controversial is the balancing of the spoken voices, for though no separate recording venue is listed, they are presented in a drier acoustic, which at least allows words to be heard clearly. As a backup, the booklet includes the English texts alongside French translations. The exposure of the voices tends to make one more critical of the actual acting, so that the over-intimacy of Puck as presented by Martin Young has one resisting at times, and his very last lines, ‘Give me your hands, if we be friends/And Robin shall restore amends’, fail to convey the necessary concluding pay-off.

Otherwise, the members of the Oxford and Cambridge Shakespeare Company, ‘founded to combine the acting talents of the two ancient universities’, are generally unexceptionable, with Jeremy Treglown as Bottom, not overdoing the regional accent, and the other ‘rude mechanicals’ also keeping within bounds in their characterisations. The sections are given separate tracks, though those not wanting to hear the spoken episodes every time, will find it difficult to disentangle the fragments from speech. Nonetheless, an excellent idea, well presented.